Paolo G.V. Martini, Ph.D.

Paolo Martini is the Chief Scientific Officer for Rare Diseases at Moderna.  With more than 20 years of experience in drug discovery working on molecular mechanisms underlying monogenic and multigenic metabolic and fibrotic disorders as well as hematologic malignancies, his laboratory is focused on identifying novel therapies and applying translational approaches for drug development in Rare Diseases. Currently exploring the identification of several targets and key animal models for translating messenger RNA therapeutic in human patients with rare genetic disorders.

Previously at Shire Pharmaceutical in Lexington, MA, as Senior Director of Discovery Biology and Translational Research, Massachusetts, his focus was on fibrotic diseases of muscle, kidney, skin, lung, bone marrow and metabolic liver diseases with particular emphasis on different therapeutic modalities for pathway modulation. He has been supporting phase 1 and 2 clinical studies for lysosomal storage and chronic kidney diseases.

He has also worked at EMD-Serono prior to Shire in Discovery Research. After graduating at the University of Milan, Italy, he moved to Germany for a post-doctoral work at Schering AG (now Bayer) in Berlin, Germany, and then to the University of Illinois in Urbana Champaign (USA). He has been collaborating with organizations supporting research and clinical development of rare metabolic disorders and fibrotic diseases and he is currently a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Keystone Symposia.